The Dead have the largest disparity between their live and nonlive recordings of any band in history. Article was at its best talking about that. But all I could think during the section about the author's first Dead concert was, "Is this what our culture looks like from the outside?" The evocative Halloween imagery, "skulking muppets," Jerry the "woodland ghoul." I don't know. Part of me hopes so.
From what I have experienced, it's not even worth listening to their recorded music. Their live music however, can be absolutely fantastic and like no other. There is a restaurant where I live called Nana taco and they play Grateful Dead live recordings constantly. Aside from the great food, I have to say that the music is one of the reasons I frequently return. Reminds me of college.
I am exactly the opposite. I don't have the desire to get a a degree in deadology to the extent that I can wade through all those tapes and find a decent one. Most of my stabs at listening to live dead shows have been disappointing, shitty sound quality or lackluster performances. I buy the dead from the dollar bin at the record store, salvation army or garage sales, I don't see any of those fancy "dicks picks" albums getting into my collection anytime soon. I do remember liking "Live Dead," but seem to have lost my copy years ago. I really like several of their studio albums. "American Beauty" is a fantastic pure American style album. "Aoxomoxoa" is a masterful work of psychedelia. "Blues for Allah" shows that they had some serious progressive chops. I like that even these earlier albums show a great deal of variety. I'm sure that that I would enjoy other studio and live albums in I was guided in the right direction, but am reasonably satisfied to enjoy the stuff I have, it's all a bit too monolithic for me.